Ashok Shandilya from India was under threat of losing Last-32 knockout match against Christopher Taylor of England.

Chris was in commanding form since start and maintained good lead in first hour of play when Shandilya got a breakthrough and made breaks of 109 and 81 points to recover the trailing points and impose 59 points win on Englishman Chris.

Multiple time world champion Rupesh Shah faced a stiff competition in his first knockout match of last 32 stage from his compatriot and a player from his same club in India, Dhvaj Haria.

Shah started off well and soon pocketed first two games scoring decent breaks of 96 and 64 points when the Junior National Champion of India, Dhvaj made a comeback with a break of 90 points in response to 98 of Shah and pocketed the third game 150(98)-140(90).

On first day, almost all top names in Billiards circuit won their matches comfortably. Amongst them, Australian Champion, Matthew Bolton controlled his first match on time before falling into any trouble.